Free notebook app is fun, useful, but lacking

Cyberlink's YouNote, a new free app at the Windows app store, is fun and even useful. It's a virtual notebook for collecting notes and pictures and putting them in pockets of interest.

We found it fun to collect notes this way under different topics, like recipe books, travel, sports, etc. Add the pictures, cartoons and scribbles and some of our notes are cute enough to use as scrapbook pages or greeting cards. The program works with regular or touch screen PCs using Windows 8. But, alas, all is not yet perfect in this infinitely perfectible universe: There are other ways to skin Schrodinger's cat.

YouNote is missing some key features found in the older and massively popular Evernote, a free program with 34 million users. In Evernote, your notes are stored in the cloud, meaning you can sign in on any computer anywhere in the world and see them. And you can search on a word and any page with that word will come up in a clickable list. (Don't search on "the.") Evernote also lets you use the "copy" and "paste" commands to easily copy bits or whole pages from the Web, which you can't do in YouNote. It's easy to edit an old note in Evernote, not so easy in YouNote. There's even a special version of Evernote for BlackBerry users (still found in remote areas), just updated in late December. You can get lots of Evernote tips by searching on "Ron's Evernote Tips." (Well named, Ron.)

COMPUTER SHOW

At the International Computer Electronics Show in Las Vegas this month, LG manufacturing will show off an all-in-one desktop with the Google Chrome operating system. It's called Chromebase. All-in-ones have all their innards stuffed into the case that holds the screen. More importantly, the big advantage of the Google operating system is that it updates your computer every time you start it up. It corrects any problems that are slowing down your system and eliminates viruses. Poof, it's magic!

How can this be? Well, in Chrome, just about everything you do takes place online. While that sounds like a disadvantage, it's handy to have a computer used only for email, Facebook, games and online apps. The price for the new Chrome desktop has not yet been revealed, but it will undoubtedly be fairly cheap. Chrome laptops, usually called Chromebooks, account for about 25 percent of the under-$300 notebook market.

ABOUT GOOGLE MUSIC

We've been fans of the Spotify online music service since the days before Gregorian chants. But now — gasp! — dare we say it: Google Play All Access may be better.

To back up a few bars, Spotify lets you listen to just about anything you can think of (no, not that), then add it to a saved collection. We have a classical list, rock list, Broadway hits and so on. Some of the lists we get from other users who made theirs public. (Yes, see what the guy across the hall is playing.) We edit out the pieces or tunes we don't like.

Google Play All Access is available in a 30-day free trial; full price is $10 a month. It has a library of millions of tunes and allows you to add in music stored on your computer, and make it available from any device you happen to use. This is possible also in Spotify, but a little more difficult to do.

If like us you have Spotify playlists that you don't want to lose by switching to Google Play All Access, there's a free utility called Portify that will transfer your Spotify list to Google Play. (Don't you just love the word "Portify?" Seriously. How about "portifyable?)

The free version of Google Play doesn't let you call up a selection and add it to your collection. But what you can do is upload music you already own, up to 20,000 items, which can then be listened to from any device. (All you people with more than 20,000 tunes, sonatas, chants, whatever are going to have to start cutting back.)

SMART CARDS

After the fiasco at Target stores, where massive amounts of credit card data were stolen, a reader asked us about the smart card that's so popular in Europe.

Yep, more than 80 countries use credit cards that have embedded computer chips, which makes card fraud a lot harder. But less than 1 percent of U.S. credit cards have them. How come? Well, it costs money. It costs five times as much to make them, and then the retailers have to get new card scanners — more money. If you want to get one, go to ThePointsGuy.com or do a search on the words "U.S. credit cards with smart chips." See stores that accept them by Googling "list of shops that accept smart cards."

LIGHT BULBS

We tested the 40 watt version of an LED light bulb from Switch and sure enough, it turned on. Gives out about 40 watts of light. Feels like a heavy drinking glass. But it's expected to last 10 years. The future is heavy, but long-lasting. A 40 watt LED bulb uses only 6 watts of energy and costs around $37 at Amazon.

KNOW YOUR COMPUTER

Belarc Advisor is a free program that will analyze your computer and let you see all the information about hardware, software and security. Its detailed report lists everything: model numbers, serial numbers and software license keys for many installed programs. If your computer needs a security update, it will tell you that too.

It's way more information than you want to know, but can be useful to tell someone from tech support; they'll be impressed.